civil war

Prisons of the Civil War: An Enduring Controversy

The June 19, 1861, editorial in the Charleston Mercury newspaper warned: “War is bloody reality, not butterfly sporting. Read more

civil war

Revolutionary War Weapons: The American Long Rifle

By the mid-1700’s, the American long rifle had acquired an almost supernatural reputation. To the British troops who were unfortunate enough to come up against it in combat during the Revolutionary War, the rifle was more an affliction than a weapon. Read more

civil war

The Pen & the Sword: A Brief History of War Correspondents

Men have been reporting their wars almost as long as they have fighting them. The first prehistoric cave drawings depicted hunters bringing down wild animals, and spoken accounts of battles, large and small, formed the starting point for the oral tradition of history. Read more

civil war

George S. Patton: A Life Shaped by Dyslexia

General George S. Patton, Jr., was one of the most flamboyant and controversial figures of World War II. Read more

civil war

The Short-range Shotgun

Coming upon the enemy’s rear guard outside the western Kentucky village of Sacramento, four days after Christmas 1861, Confederate Colonel Nathan Bedford Forrest ordered his cavalry to advance. Read more

civil war

Pollepel Island: Private Fortress on the Hudson

In central New York, 50 miles north of New York City on the Hudson River, is a small spit of land known as Bannerman Island. Read more

civil war

Kansas Brigadier James Henry Lane

At dawn on August 21, 1863, 450 Confederate Irregulars under William C. Quantrill descended on the town of Lawrence, Kansas. Read more

civil war

The Creation of the U.S. Sanitary Commission

In the spring of 1861, a group of influential northern men and women, led by Unitarian minister Henry Whitney Bellows and social reformer Dorothea Dix, met in New York City to discuss the formation of a sanitary commission, modeled after the British Sanitary Commission established during the Crimean War, to provide relief to sick and wounded soldiers in the Union Army. Read more

civil war

Gallant Charge at Antietam

The Union soldiers of Colonel Harrison Fairchild’s brigade prepared to attack uphill against a key Rebel position on the outskirts of Sharpsburg at 3 pm on September 17, 1862. Read more

civil war

Disaster at Fort Donelson

A signal rocket set off by Confederate pickets streaked skyward in the damp early morning of February 4, 1862. Read more

civil war

The Crater: Explosion of Death

It was just after 3 am on Saturday, July 30, 1864. A month of relative quiet along a two-mile stretch of Union and Confederate trench lines immediately east of Petersburg, Virginia, was about to come to an explosive end. Read more

civil war

Evolution of the Submarine

The concept of a ship that could submerge beneath the water and then resurface dates back as far as the late 1400s, when Italian Renaissance artist and inventor Leonardo da Vinci claimed to have found a method for a ship to remain submerged for a protracted period of time. Read more

civil war

Union General August Willich

“A soldier in every phrase of the term, able and skillful, on many a bloody field he demonstrated his ability and courage,” Brig. Read more

civil war

Sharp Clash at North Anna

Dripping wet Union soldiers stepped out of the North Anna River’s Jericho Ford on May 22, 1864, setting foot in Hanover County, Virginia. Read more

civil war

Long Odds At the Battle of Jonesborough

At the Battle of Jonsborough, Union General William T. Sherman hoped to destroy the Army of Tennessee and seize Atlanta, Georgia.  Read more

civil war

Confederate Submarine H. L. Hunley

At the start of the American Civil War in April 1861, U.S. President Abraham Lincoln proclaimed that he planned to blockade the Confederacy by stationing warships in waters off its shores. Read more

civil war

Soldiers: Edward O.C. Ord

By Frank Jastrzembki

Five busts of his greatest lieutenants during the Civil War watch over the sarcophagus of Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Read more

civil war

American Civil War Timeline: Piecemeal Operations

U.S. President Abraham Lincoln had no military experience and discarded most of Lt. Gen. Winfield Scott’s so-called Anaconda Plan, which critics deemed too conservative. Read more

civil war

Woefully Unequipped For the American Civil War

When the American Civil War erupted in 1861 Iowa soldiers were equipped with old converted smoothbore flintlock muskets. Read more

civil war

Museum Exhibit Celebrates Civil War Sesquicentennial

In celebration of the sesquicentennials of General William T. Sherman’s Atlanta Campaign and March to the Sea, the Southern Museum of Civil War and Locomotive History is opening a special exhibit titled “1864.” Read more